Abstract
—There is a significant population of hearingimpaired people who reside in South Africa; however,
South African Sign Language (SASL) has not yet been
recognized as South Africa’s 12th official language, resulting
in slow uptake of this important language. Since most
people do not know SASL, there is a need for gesture
recognition systems that convert Sign Language (SL) to
verbal and/or text to reduce the communication barriers
between the hearing and the hearing-impaired. This study
presents an application for gesture recognition in
converting SASL to both a verbal format and a textual
format. By using gesture recognition from a single wearable
glove, hand gestures were quantified, categorized, and then
converted into an auditory format and played on a speaker,
as well as the equivalent textual information displayed on
an LCD screen. The complete prototype consists of a
wearable glove with a transmitter and an associated
receiver box which were all designed to cost less than $150.
The glove consists of five flex sensors that measure the
handshape and an inertial measurement unit which
measures the hand motion. The handshape and motion data
are processed and wirelessly transmitted to a receiver box.
This then displays the associated English character on an
LCD while also playing the audio on a speaker. The SL
converter can convert the 26 letters of the SASL manual
alphabet with an overall accuracy of 69%, It can also
convert common words and phrases, as well as proper
names when fingerspelled.